1030 Supply of Urban Trees (MARKET ENGAGEMENT)

Description

Essex County Council (ECC), through The Essex Forest Initiative (EFI), has committed to planting £1 million worth of trees over five years from 2019. This includes planting 375,000 trees, over 150 hectares. Essex County Council is seeking to procure at least 2200 containerised standards to plant in urban areas over winter 2023-24. Ahead of publishing this opportunity in September 2023, the Authority is looking to assess the interest and capability of the market to provide and deliver the requirement as set out in the Project Description and would like to invite interested parties to register their interest in this opportunity and respond to the questionnaire that can be obtained via ProContract. Lot 1: Project Description ECC are looking to appoint a contractor to provide and undertake the works as a principal contractor to supply 2220 standard trees within the area of Essex to commence Winter 2023 / 2024. The supply and services will involve: • Supply and Delivery of standard trees measured at between 10-14cm diameter at chest height. • All trees need to be available for delivery between November 2023 and February 2024. • To be Plant healthy certified (biosecurity protocols). • Delivered in the container in which they have been grown to avoid root disturbance and drying out at the point of dispatch as trees are repackaged. • Evidence of inspection of the trees before delivery to check for disease/pests. • Delivery to: one address within Essex. A minimum level of specification is outlined below: • Trees should be delivered in the pot or container in which they have been grown to avoid root disturbance and drying out at the point of dispatch. Pots are of a suitable size to enable root development. • The Nursery should demonstrate that its trees are grown in the UK where possible and that an appropriate quarantine period is implemented when importation of trees is necessary. • The Nursery should demonstrate that it has procedures in place to ensure that root circling, root girdling and other root defects have been avoided as much as is possible prior to dispatch and planting. The Nursey should also be able to inform the EFI of the length of time any tree or batch of trees supplied have been in their container. • The Nursery should be able to demonstrate that it has adopted procedures that ensure that trees are in optimum condition at the time of dispatch and has adopted a testing programme which ensures, as far as is possible, that trees are free from pests and or disease and are not a biosecurity risk. The nursery should list techniques or monitoring used to ensure the health of the trees. • The Nursery should demonstrate best practice plant handling techniques for transporting trees from The Nursery and to delivery site. • The Nursery should be Plant Healthy certified. If you feel that you can meet the above requirements, please submit an Expression of Interest and respond to the questionnaire pack. Further details and the questionnaire pack can be located via the Council's e-sourcing portal, ProContract: https://procontract.due-north.com/Login. Please note that you will need to register a supplier account to access the questionnaire pack. However, the registration process is free of charge and provides access to all the current and forthcoming procurement opportunities for Essex County Council alongside several other public sector organisations. The deadline for the questionnaire responses is Friday 25th August 2023 at 12:00pm; all responses and clarifications must be submitted via ProContract. Please note that this Prior Information Notice (PIN) is not a call for competition and as such you will need to express your interest in any future tender opportunity once the contract notice is published in Find a Tender and on Contracts Finder. It should also be noted that this PIN invites individuals and organisations to express an interest in this exercise only, and it is NOT a pre-qualification questionnaire, and is NOT part of any pre-qualification or selection process for a future opportunity.